BOOM BOX
by Shade the Hero
Summary: What would you do if your peaceful evening was disrupted by music? Join he inhabitants of Shinra as they are forced to find out the hard way.


_It really amazes me how reading some really great stories can inspire me to write a one-shot completely off the top of my head. Don't ask me where these sudden ideas come from because I have no clue. This was inspired after reading the amazing works of "Legacy" from RegenesisX and "Diet Water" from x. Ales .x (Go read them!) _

_Final Fantasy and all related characters belongs to Square Enix. The madness belongs to me. xD_

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**BOOM BOX  
**

Director Lazard was about to finish up another tiresome day. In all honesty it had been quite boring. This was a good thing. No surprises, no mouthy turks with attitude, no high strung Firsts, over-energetic Seconds, No clumsy Cadets whose mess had to be cleaned up, no one-on-one chats to generals who needed the simplest things explained in full detail -it really was sad and Lazard had told him he needed to get out more-, nothing had gone wrong today. Aside from the normal paperwork today had been good. So, why did he have a bad feeling?

In another part of the building, in the Scarlett-decorated apartment of one First Class Commander, said red-head was enjoying a quiet, relaxing evening reading his favorite book. He had lost count of how many times he had read it, and could recite it with his eyes closed both forwards and back with no trouble. Some even had the nerve to call his love for the novel an 'obsession' and threw words at him like 'unhealthy' and 'unnatural'. Instead of throwing words back at them he threw fireballs. No one, _NO ONE _came between him and his beloved Loveless. Blowing on his cup of hot chocolate to cool it, he took another sip and flipped the page.

Up in his apartment, First Class Angeal Hewely was meditating. It was something he had taken up shortly after taking in an apprentice. He found it did wonders for his frayed nerves. It worked so well sometimes that he had actually fallen asleep in his cross-legged position on the small matt and woke up feeling quite relaxed. He was actually just starting to drift off at this very moment.

General Sephiroth was busy in his office typing up reports and looking into a few mission reports. Some things had happened between a two groups of thirds and the General was trying to get to the bottom of who started what and who needed to be reminded of their place. He also had to figure out who kept taking his delivery of personal Shinra-issued shampoo. That was the fifth order this week that had vanished.

A spiky-haired Cadet with chocobo-blonde hair was fighting to stay awake as he tried to study. The exams were not far away and he wanted to be ready. Ever since his last class ended several hours ago he had been hard at work trying to get things memorized and committed to memory, but it was getting harder and harder to read through his eye lids with each passing minute. Finally, gravity won and the blonde's head plopped onto the thick pages of the book, which were surprisingly soft and severed as a good pillow.

The night promised to be peaceful and all of the residents within Shinra welcomed such a rare and wonderful gift. It disappointed so many when the peace suddenly shattered.

It started out low, echoing through the ventilation system. Suddenly the volume blasted throughout the building resulting in several things happening at once. A dark-haired First and a blonde Cadet were jolted awake. The First having jumped to his feet with his hand grasped on the hilt of his sword while the blonde nearly had a heart attack, flailed in a panic and shrieked as his chair fell back. A red-headed Commander shrieked for another reason as the mug of hot chocolate had fallen from his hand and split all over his favorite book. The General covered his ears and his eyes nearly bulged out of his head as his foot pulled out the power cord, successfully shutting off his computer and deleted all of the three-hundred thousand word report he had just finished and was about to save. Now it was gone and he would have to start All. Over. Again.

Back in the director's office he was just reaching for the light switch in his office when the vents began blaring the...he didn't exactly want to call it music, as he couldn't understand it. That's when his phone started ringing off the hook. This was a bad idea. This was a bad idea. He kept telling himself this with each step until he reached his desk. with a deep breath he picked up the phone.

Every call was the same. Countless people from different ranks and branches within the company were in an uproar which left the director with only one conclusion. The entire building was in complete chaos.

Lazard did the only thing he could do. He called in the three Firsts. He was about to call them when the door flung open, slamming against the wall and the very trio he wanted to see came stomping in. Angeal was trying to tune out the offending noise, Sephiroth's right eye was twitching and it was clear he was trying very hard not to run the nearest thing through with his sword, and Genesis, well...Lazard took the notion that the Commander was leaving burnt footsteps in his wake as a bad sign.

"Tell me who is responsible for this so I can skewer him and roast him over a fire!" The commander demanded in a low, dangerous tone.

"That's only if I don't get to him first," replied Sephiroth, still having trouble getting the twitch under control.

"Perhaps it's the Thirds or the Cadets throwing a party?" offered Angeal who was trying to be the most civil of the group. It wasn't easy though.

"_The Cadets!_"Genesis seethed. Everyone could feel the temperature rising in the room as the man practically radiated with the heat of a supernova, ready to explode.

"I'll see to the Cadets," Sephiroth offered. "Gen can check the Thirds and Seconds and Angeal can handle the other floors with help from the Turks. The one responsible for this will be brought to justice."

"I hope so, my precious Loveless is forever ruined!" Genesis choked back a sob, but soon returned to his previous enraged mood. Determined to avenge his beloved novel.

"Bring him to me when you've found him," Ordered Lazard. The others nodded and headed out.

Sephiroth had checked the entire Cadet floor and was left with only the study room. Not wanting to leave a single stone unturned he entered the room and looked around.

"All cadets assemble by the door!" He barked, but no one came. satisfied that no one was there he went to close the door when the faintest cry to help reached his enhanced ears. It was a surprise he heard it over the still-blaring vents.

Sephiroth walked along the isles, scanning the area as he went when he saw a desk with a light on and noticed a large pile of books that were littered in front of it. The general approached it and looked down, was there a chair underneath that pile? He removed a few books and his eyes grew wide when a few blonde spikes became visible.

He quickly made to uncover the rest of a cadet who had become buried under a mountain of knowledge.

"Thank you, I thought I was going to suffocate under there," he replied when the general had freed him of his prison.

"You're welcome, Cadet."

The boy looked up and nearly had his second heart attack. "G-g-general Sephiroth?!" He shot up to attention only to slip on a book and fall back into the desk behind him, hitting his head on the way down. He rubbed the area of contact with tears of pain in his eyes.

The general tried not to laugh, the boy had already suffered enough it seemed. "At ease, Cadet. I'm not going to impale you, however I can't say the same for whoever's responsible for that horrible noise." He glared up at the vents in disgust. He was getting tired of hearing the sound of the annoying pulse that was beginning to drum into his brain.

"Do you have any idea whose behind this,...uh?"

"Cadet Cloud Strife, sir and I'm not happy about it either. I was trying to study for my exams when that music started up and sca-er, surprised me."

Sephiroth felt sympathy for him and shared his frustraition, since he had been working hard previously himself. "Since you have a valid reason for bringing this villain to justice, would you like to assist me in his capture?"

Cloud blinked in awe at the general. He was asking him if he, Cloud Strife, a lowly cadet, would like to help him? If it weren't for the bump on his head he would have been convinced he was dreaming.

"Y-yes sir. I would."

Sephiroth nodded and headed for the door. Cloud hurried to catch up.

All of the parties had spent an hour searching for the culprit. Reno and the other turks had checked the turk and business floors, Lazard and some of the other members of the staff checked the labs and the other, less visited parts of the building. The Seconds and Thirds had been sent to search the mess hall, training rooms and other areas while the cadets and their instructors had been ordered to search the grounds outside.

Sephiroth, Angeal and an exhausted cadet were taking a rest in the hall outside of the director's office. Suddenly their attention was shifted to the approaching Second Class SOLDIER, Kunsel.

"Sirs, I found him! He's in training room 49."

Five minutes later, Sephiroth, Genesis, Angeal, Cloud, Kunsel, and Lazard were standing outside of the training room. The general turned to the group and mouthed to them while holding up his fingers as he counted down. _"One...Two...Three!"_

They burst into the room, ready to unleash hell and break up whatever was going on. They expected a party, or something similar, but what they saw left them all utterly stunned.

One Second Class SOLDIER with Black, spiky hair was doing several exercises, while keeping perfect timing with the music, which according to the current track was the surprisingly popular Gangnum Style. The SOLDIER in question was doing squats, hitting a punching bag, and swinging his sword as he danced to the music. If the onlookers hadn't been in shock the sight would have been comical.

Suddenly Genesis' shock melted under his blazing temper. With a fireball he glared daggers at the radio in the corner. It was turned so it was facing the vents and with his enhanced sight he saw that the volume was on max. Looking around he could see several vents in the ceiling and realized the idiot was trying to get the sound to travel farther.

The SOLDIER stopped in mid punch when the music abruptly stopped. He looked over only to gasp in shock when he saw that his beloved radio had bene melted! He turned to look at the assembled crowd in utter shock.

"Why? Why did you destroy my tunes?" he whimpered.

"Your _tunes?!"_ Bellowed Genesis, "_That's _what you call that horrendous noise?!"

"Um, yes?"

"Zack..." The Second turned to look at both Sephiroth and Angeal who had spoken at the same time. The general let Angeal have the floor, as it was his pupil.

"Can you tell me what part of your mind thought this was a good idea?"

Zack scratched his head. "Um, well I needed good training music and I couldn't really hear it that well from in the corner where the only plug is so I thought it'd carry better through the vents?"

Now it was Sephiroth's turn. "Oh it carried alright,...throughout the en_tire Shinra Building complex!_ Your little stunt has caused nothing short of complete chaos!"

"Oh, c'mon Seph, how much damage can music do?"

Sephrioth pointed towards the cadet standing on the other side of Angeal. "This young cadet was jolted from his studies and buried under a mound of books,-"

"-Oh hey Spiky! Didn't see you there!" Zack interrupted when he saw his buddy Cloud, who just seemed nervous under the flaring, collective tempers of the firsts and felt pity for the friend he was about to lose.

Sephiroth was actually snarling at the second which only made the blonde want to flee the room all the more.

"You caused me to lose an entire full-length report that I had spent the past four hours on, you ruined whatever peace the director and Angeal had, you caused Genesis to ruin his favorite book, you wreaked havoc among your fellow SOLDIERs, sent the Turks into a riot and I won't even go into detail about what matter of madness you set off in the labs."

Zack raised his hands defensively in front of him as he took a step back. "Okay, okay, I'm sorry. I won't do it again. I was just trying to enjoy my favorite music-wait, back up. What did you say about Genesis?"

A slow smile crawled up the commander's right cheek and the look in his eyes gave Zack a sudden urge to change his pants.

"Do you know what **_my_** favorite song is, Mr. Fair?"

Zack gulped and shook his head.

"It's a wonderful song, perhaps you've heard of it before? It's called, 'My songs know what you did in the dark'."

"That's...a mouthful," Zack replied.

"Indeed, do you know what its shorter title is?"

The SOLDIER shook his head, but his eyes instantly lit up in a panic as the Commander raised a flaming arm and pointed his clenched fist at Zack.

"Light 'em Up."

Zack spent the next hour running through the halls of Shinra, trying to escape the flaming wrath of Genesis Rhapsodos who was hot on his trail throwing fireball after fireball at the puppy.

Cloud had mixed feelings about this punishment and looked up at his superiors. "Sh-shouldn't we do something?"

"If he can survive for another hour then Angeal and I will step in and save the puppy," Sephiroth replied.

"Agreed," replied Angeal. Everyone else nodded their heads in approval.

* * *

_Farewell, Zack. We'll miss you. *sniffles* T~T_


End file.
